Chad Billingsley got off to an extremely strong start to the 2012 season by pitching 8 1/3 innings of shutout baseball against the San Diego Padres last night. He struck out 11 and walked 1.
The big knock against Billingsley has always been his consistency. He has usually started strong and faltered after the All-Star break. This was the kind of start he needed and hopefully will answer a lot of questions Dodgers fans had about whether he can finally harness his potential. He put in the work this spring without really getting any results but now it counts.
He had a rocky spring training and even spoke of scrapping his cutter altogether. He slightly altered his motion to give him more balance and consistency and it looked like it all came together last night. The cutter and slider were consistent and sharp into the 8th inning and he maintained his velocity of 90-93 MPH into the 9th.
Andre Ethier also had a strong performance against the left-handed starter for the Padres, doubling and tripling and driving in 4 runs. He was really driving the ball. There was questions in the spring about whether Ethier would possibly sit against left-handed pitching this season after he struggled last season against lefties. Manager Don Mattingly sat James Loney last night.
The Dodgers are 2-0 and the two newest additions, Chris Capuano and Aaron Harang are up next, and a sweep would be really sweet.
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